


Avada Kedavra; With Love

by inamac



Series: Fae Universe [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-10-17
Updated: 2007-10-17
Packaged: 2017-10-18 06:25:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/185959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inamac/pseuds/inamac
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The night before the capture of the Trio, the Malfoy family takes a desperate gamble to survive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Avada Kedavra; With Love

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place between Chapters 22 and 23 of DH – a small attempt to make sense of some of the questions posed by those events (or not). Thanks to Lil Shepherd for beta.

# Avada Kedavra; With Love

The single wrought-iron lamp turned lazily on its chain, its flame setting shadows flicking around the cellar, over the brick-vaulted ceiling, the racks of bottles ranked against the limewashed walls, the fat bellies of brandy barrels shelved in the arched alcoves - and on the dark red robes and white-blond hair of the Lord of the Manor bending over the naked body of his heir.

"It will not be easy, Draco," Lucius Malfoy's long fingers moved through his son's hair, caressing the boy as he had not done since he was an infant. "And dangerous. To pass through death, to taste it, and beyond, this is power such as neither Malfoy nor Black has wielded for a thousand years. It is our only hope to challenge the Dark Lord. You want that, don't you?"

Draco shivered, feeling the shackles cold on his flesh, the roughness of the stone pillar against his bare back. But there was no other answer he could give. This was his Father, whom he loved, and who would never punish or praise without cause. And who would not ask of his son anything that he had not, would not, risk himself.

"Yes, Father."

"My darling, are you sure?" There was a clink and slither, metal and leather being dropped on a table, and Narcissa stepped from the shadows to put her hand on her husband's shoulder. She was wearing nothing but a light, almost transparent, linen shift. Her hair, unbound, flowed down her back, white silk against the coarse cream fabric. The wand in her hand was the only dark thing about her, a line of ebon blackness slashed across the curve of her hip. Her expression was cold - Harry Potter would have thought it haughty - but both men recognised the control that covered fear.

Lucius rose and turned at her touch, circling her waist with one arm to pull her closer into a tender, reassuring kiss. "If I were sure," he said when they broke apart, "there would be no need for these." He gestured to the restraints which secured their son to the pillar. "My love, the Dark Lord is far away, too occupied with his own matters to watch us here. Bellatrix has our prisoners in the East Wing to occupy her. And it is Eostre, a time of sacrifice and rebirth. We will have no better opportunity to do this work."

As if to underline his words there was a distant scream from beyond the cellar walls. The three occupants tensed for a moment, until a second cry answered the first, identifying the source as the pair of white peacocks out in the park, challenging for supremacy in their Spring mating ritual. It may not have been the scream of one of Bellatrix's victims, but it was a reminder that time was running out.

Narcissa shivered, but not from the cellar's chill. "This could destroy us all," she whispered.

It was Draco who answered her, his own voice hoarse with emotion, with the memories of being forced to torture for Voldemort's pleasure, and being punished for failing to kill at Voldemort's command. "Better dead now than enslaved to that monster." He looked up, grey eyes meeting grey. "Father... please..."

Lucius nodded. He held out his hand to his wife and she placed her wand, the most powerful magical tool left to the family since Potter had blasted Lucius's wand from Voldemort's hand, onto her husband's open palm. She sighed as his long fingers closed around it.

He inclined his head in acknowledgement, unbound white hair swinging forward to obscure the torment in his eyes. There was no further need for words between them, not until the magical work they had come to do was over. And after that – words might never be needed again.

Wife and son nodded in unison. Draco braced himself against the pillar, pale flesh against marble, ghostly in the lamplight. Narcissa moved to stand between the two men, hands alternately flexing and balling into fists at her side.

Lucius ran his fingers lightly down the length of the wand, testing its power, before he turned, silk the colour of dried blood swirling around him. He took half a dozen steps to the far side of the cellar. His boot-heels sounded loud on the flagstones. The only other sound was the clink of chains as Draco shifted.

Waiting.

Then, in one fluid, almost balletic, movement, Lucius spun, raised the wand, aimed directly at his son's heart and growled with absolute, terrifying conviction: _"Avada Kedavra!"_

 _"Amore!"_

Narcissa flung herself forward, into the path of the spell, one hand extended to her son, the other to her husband. The green lightning of the killing curse hit her, crackled through her body, so that she hung, crucified, for a moment between them, strung on a line of light that ran from the tip of the wand to Draco's arced chest. She seemed to be suspended for an eternity before the force of the spell rebounded, hurling Lucius backwards, his body skidding across the stone floor to crash into the far wall. Draco, chained immobile, screamed his throat raw as the fire burned his heart until he, too, slumped.

The light died, releasing Narcissa's body to fall between the others.

For a long time nothing breathed in the chamber.

***

"Malfoy?"

Light spilled into the cellar as the door to the pantry above opened, and then was blocked as a black robed figure stepped through to take in the scene below. He muttered a curse as he swept down the steps to bend over the naked youth hanging unconscious at their foot. Wand-light seared against the shackles like a Muggle thermic lance, and with the same effect. The wizard caught the young man's body as the chains fell away and eased him down to the floor. "Draco?" The wand moved again, another wordless spell, and the youth coughed - and breathed.

"Alive." The word was a croak from the far side of the room. It might have been a statement, a question or an exclamation.

The newcomer did not reply immediately, moving from the boy to the prone form of his mother, resting gentle fingers on her exposed throat to feel for a pulse, then turning the back of his hand against her face to feel her breath. Satisfied by the results of both tests, he gave a nod, and an equally terse answer; "Apparently."

Using the support of the wine rack against which the backlash of the spell had hurled him, Lucius pulled himself slowly and painfully to his feet. "What..." He choked, reached out to pick up one of the bottles which had been dislodged from the rack by his fall, uncorked it with a spell, and tipped it to his lips. Lubricated by the liquor he spoke more clearly. "What the hell are you doing here, Severus?"

"Saving your hide." Snape had lifted Narcissa to a sitting position. Supporting her with one arm, he held out the other to Lucius who correctly interpreted the gesture and handed over the bottle. Snape glanced at the label before lifting it to the woman's mouth. "Really, Lucius. '47 Baron de Lustrac?"

The older man shrugged, shook his robes back into place, and stepped carefully around his wife and friend to go to his son.

Draco's fingers were splayed across his heart, covering the place where the fire of the spell, filtered through his Mother's body and tempered by her love, had hit him. Gently Lucius lifted the hand away, revealing not the expected lightning bolt scar, but a twisted red line, half burn, half scar, vivid against white flesh.

"Did it -" Draco broke off and coughed convulsively. His father summoned the brandy bottle from where Snape had left it, and lifted it to the boy's lips. When he spoke again it was with more strength, but no less fear. "Did it work?"

Lucius turned the hand that still held Narcissa's wand. The silk sleeve of his robe slipped down to his elbow, revealing a scar that matched Draco's on the flesh which had borne the Dark Mark for fifteen years. "Yes," he said. "We owe your Mother our future."

There was a sarcastic snort from Snape as he helped Narcissa to her feet. "Very touching. It was an insane risk. It could have killed you all."

Lucius' response was colder than the air of the cellar. "Did you think that our family had anything left to live for, Severus? The only risk was that I alone might survive, still bound to that monster by his damned Imperius Curse."

"And the curse is broken?"

"Death breaks all curses," said Narcissa, quietly.

"And the love of a mother - and a wife - can defeat death." Snape's voice was absolutely flat; expressionless. Only Narcissa was close enough to see the pain and – envy? - in his eyes.

"It can deflect the Killing Curse," said Lucius. "Lily Potter proved that. She had love enough to save her son." His arms closed around his wife, pulling her into a tender kiss before he released her and handed her back her wand. "Narcissa has love enough for us both. Harry Potter is no longer the only person to survive the Killing Curse. If he fails to fulfil the Prophecy and take down the Dark Lord, we may have another hope."

"You sound like a muggle romance," Snape sneered. "So – you are free of the Imperius. What now?"

"Oh, we play the game out to its end. We give Potter his chance. The Prophecy was quite… encouraging."

Snape looked at him sharply. "You told Him that the record of the Prophecy had been destroyed."

"It was. It smashed practically at my feet." Lucius gave him a grin, an expression that was rarely seen by anyone outside of his immediate family, and never while he had lived under Voldemort's Imperius Curse. "I admit that I was too preoccupied at the time to hear it, but a pensieve gives one the leisure to examine such memories." If he had been expecting Snape to be curious about the precise content of the prophecy he was to be disappointed.

"Well, we don't have any leisure now," the Headmaster snapped.

Lucius cocked an enquiring eyebrow. "I was going to ask what brought you down here, Severus. Not that your intervention wasn't welcome…"

"Greyback is on his way here."

A chill ran round the room at the sound of the werewolf's name, compounded by Snape's next words.

"And he believes that he has captured Harry Potter."

Lucius took a breath. "It's too soon," he said, looking briefly panicked.

"We play the cards we are dealt, love." Narcissa laid her hand on her husband's left arm. "Greyback could be mistaken. And if he is not… well, he cannot call the Dark Lord."

Lucius looked down at her hand, covering it with his own to slide back the sleeve of his robe again to reveal his forearm, where the long-hated scar of the Dark Mark had been replaced by the symbol of his wife's sacrifice. Not a lightning scar, but a twisted figure eight; serpentine, eternity. "It seems that I cannot, either."

Narcissa looked thoughtful. "Greyback at least will expect to see it. A glamour?" she suggested.

Her husband shook his head. "Not sustainable without my own wand." He looked at Snape. "And we have no time to brew a disguising potion."

Snape frowned thoughtfully, then drew his own wand and pulled up his left sleeve to reveal his own Dark Mark. With the wand-tip he traced the sinuous curves of the design, murmuring an incantation that limed the Mark in green fire, and seemed to lift it, glowing in the cellar's dimness, to hover between them before, commanded by the wand, it settled on Lucius' arm, obscuring the new scar under the familiar black skull and serpent.

"It won't work to summon Him, of course," said Snape, "but it may buy you time, if you can prevent Bellatrix using hers."

Lucius nodded, looking as though he would relish the thought of preventing his sister in law from doing as she wished. Preferably with the use of force.

Snape pocketed his wand and fairly ran up the stairs, taking them two at a time. "I need to get back to the school," he said. He looked back over his shoulder as he reached the door. "Oh, Lucius? One thing more."

"Yes?"

"Did you re-set your house-elf wards after Potter released that elf of yours."

Lucius looked puzzled. "No."

"Then don't."

As the Headmaster apparated away, there came the metallic clang of the gate-warning, announcing to the House the arrival of Fenrir Greyback and his captives.

Narcissa, recognising the exhaustion of the two men, used her wand to transfigure the shift she had worn for the ritual into her usual day-robe. She crossed the cellar to retrieve her belt, with the chatelaine and keys that marked her authority as mistress of the house, and Draco's wand, from the table where they had been dropped earlier. "I will meet them," she said, tossing the wand to her husband. "Take Draco and get changed. Then wait in the purple drawing room. I'll bring them there. Severus is right – we must buy time."

Lucius nodded, caught the wand, enfolded his son in his robe, and disapparated.

Narcissa settled her belt at her waist, sheathed her wand, and walked slowly up the stairs, closing and locking the door behind her with a creak of iron hinges.

In the emptiness of the cellar, the lamp went out.

Fin


End file.
